Skippyjon Jones

As teachers, we have to carry Emergency Bags with us when we go out to the playground, or outside for a fire drill, or generally any time we are outside of the classroom for an extended period of time.

Most teachers at our school have one of those draw-string backpacks so generously donated by Geico, complete with the lizard and GEICO emblazoned across the front.  I say most because mine broke. Actually, it never really worked to begin with. Something about the drawstrings failed to close the bag. Finally, I just asked if I could replace my bag with my own backpack. 

Luckily, I had this one lying around from when my mom got the entire Skippyjon Kohl's Cares collection.

I've always been a fan of Skippyjon (perhaps because I am Mexican but can't speak Spanish, so growing up my friends always called me pretend Mexican, which Skippyjon likes to pretend himself).  Always good to have a personal connection to a fictional Siamese cat, I say.

Anyway, because the kiddos are so used to seeing me wear this backpack, they asked if we could read some Skippyjon Jones books.  I said OF COURSE we can! So we read a couple (Skippyjon Jones Lost in Spice and Skippyjon Jones Cirque de Olé) and here's the project & writing that followed:

My favorite part of the story was when Skippyjon fell on Momma's head.

My favorite part of Skippyjon Jones was when Skippyjon Jones was pretending to be a circus actor.

My favorite part was when Skippyjon Jones was on the trapeze. There was a cannon!

We're big on writing about our favorite part of stories we read these days.  It helps keep the students focused during the story and makes them think about the story after we've finished reading.

Of course, students just learning to apply letter sounds made the same picture but labeled the picture instead of writing about their favorite part:

I just love how these turned out.  The students all enjoyed making them. We'll be sure to read more Skippyjon in the future...